dragging out the scapegoats

[Murthy Yenamandra]

> Jasper Fidget wrote:
> > [...] The way such a person succeeds all
> > the way to the White House must be in his sponge-like ability (itself
> > extraordinary) to adopt and live the answers, convictions, and beliefs of
> > others.  I see GW therefore as our first *committee* presidency, less a
> > puppet than a vessel, or a chorus, and I feel much more comfortable with
> > that.

No reason to think that GWB is just a vessel for others and has to adopt
and live others' answers and convictions. It is very much likely that he
shares the answers and convictions of the people who picked him as the
front man and the people who were picked by him to implement the
answers. It's pretty irrelevant how smart he is and how original his
convictions and answers are (and whether he arrived at them out of
curiosity and analysis or inherited them from his dad), as long as his
team sold the package to the country.

Terrance writes:
> [...] a President doesn't have to look
> smart or even talk smart to be good and smart president. 

Doesn't even have to _be_ good or smart either. We still have to deal
with the policies.

> My point, my only point really, is that we should critique the
> President's policies at least as often as we call him stupid and make
> fun of his language inadequacies. 

And whether he is "smart", assuming we can define and evaluate it, is
tangential to all of the above, and is a distracting question to ask. 

-- 
Murthy Yenamandra                  mailto:yenamand at cs.umn.edu
"I strive to be brief, but I become obscure." - Horace